Like Switzerland

It's a funny thing about the glory of color. It can be bright. It can be dull. It can be loud or it can be quiet. The power in the story of color is in the telling - how each author combines the same elements in oh so different ways. My most recent approach to color at home has been about accents. I've done the fancy fabrics, the fully coordinated room, the casual thrown together look. I liked each - very much - in its time. But this new approach satisfies visually, emotionally and mentally since it also panders to my penchant for organizing. In spring the living room is porcelain blue with taupe and ivory; summer = shades of lime and chartreuse; fall, of course, features the rusted and bronzed tones of autumn leaves; Chrsitmas has its muted reds and greens to coordinate with all the Santas and trimming. The key is that the permanent features - walls, sofa, chairs and floor - are all done in neutrals from ecru to taupe to chestnut and wenge. Every 3 months I go about swapping out pillow covers, drapes, area rugs and accessories to fill out a look completely different than the last. I carefully select pieces, either from my stored collections or bought new, to create the perfect tableau on the mantle. I assemble and document the various pillow sizes and shapes, covers and inserts so there are always choices for the club chair, sofa and side chairs. I iron endless yards of silk and cotton, ensuring the appropriate fabric in all the right colors are ready for their call to duty. A decorator's dream and heaven for an obsessive-compulsive nutcase like me! Yet one innocent visit to a nearby style shop and I am contemplating throwing it all overboard, for my life in color is not always what its cracked up to be. A recent trip to Anthropologie and I was bitten by the color bug. It's not, of course, the first time I've been there. One of the first outposts of this interesting and unique chain thrived within 5 miles of my house in Glen Cove. And it's not the first time I've been smitten by the goods they carry. Smitten and bitten! Really? Anyway as I was saying this recent shopping trip, for reasons indeterminate, has me feeling that my rooms are a bit boring...safe...blah! That has never really bothered me before. I have always chosen what makes sense for my lifestyle over the gorgeous, impressive, wow-inducing stuff in magazines. I suspect my discontent now has something to do with - first - being unemployed and  - second - with being employed in a non-design position. Maybe I am feeling ... design-deprived! That day at Anthro sparked the creativity that I have abandoned as of late. So I am contemplating revamping my entire approach to decorating. I want to buy every little thing I see and like. I want to have sheets and towels and pillows and drapes and rugs that are a wild riot of color and pattern. I want to use ALL my dishes, in ALL their colors ALL the time, rather than choosing which single color to pair with my white basics! I want to buy an artist’s original painting that brazenly boasts bold splashes of color and texture rather than an orderly and elegant landscape or still life! I want to go crazy. I am reading more color me katie. I am fascinated by bleubird's fabulously cinematic wedding. I used to be put off by the color riot, but now, maybe...just maybe...